A Smile Like The Sun (Novella)

(finished)Blayke Hanson struggles with memories of the past about his best friend Evaine Longing, the girl he had loves since the moment he met her. Their relationship had always been complicated, his parent's did not accept her as he had wished they would because she was diagnosed with being severely retarded, and her step mother hated her for it and hated Blayke still for the feelings he had for her.
After two years have gone by since he's seen her he decides to hop on a plane and down to Florida where she now resides in a home for the mentally deprived. ( For EmilieHail's Valentines Day contest)
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Chapters:

Have you ever known
someone for so long- believed that you were so close to them
nothing could possibly separate you?

Have you known someone
like that- in that way- and felt so . . . far away from
them?

She did this to
me.

I still don't -to this
very day- understand why I let myself fall for someone like her
the way I did, when it was clear!- obviously, painfully,
pristinely clear that we were not meant to be.

But she was so
beautiful: her eyes the color of the sunset, so warm- so
inviting- yet so distant, yet curious; her very self was
something to just . . . cherish. It was inevitable for me; like
being dragged down deep under the never ending sea kicking and
grasping- panicking- as you try so hard to get back to the
surface for air.

She was my bottomless
ocean and my surface.

She was no good for
me, yet I needed her to live.

Her name was Evaine
Longing.

Ironically, she had
the name that basically told its own story, because I did exactly
that: long for her.

She was my next door
neighbor for fourteen years.

She was also my best
friend.

I will tell you this
now: it is always . . . always the best friend.

I've cursed them ever
since- since. . .

She was my best friend
that is all that matters for the moment.

We were six when we
first met.

It was winter time in
New England- a very brutal winter which to this day I am
surprised we ever met at all because our encounter involved the
outdoors. Either way: we met, and still, like the idiot that I
am, I do not regret meeting her.